Ticket To Heaven

“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”    -- Karl Marx

I forget which artist, but I was listening to a comedian on a comedy channel on satellite radio during one of our road trips. She did a bit about reaching the end of a long and productive life, and when she realized that, as a departed soul, she was standing before the pearly gates of heaven, she eagerly anticipated entrance to paradise. She said that she had been a good girl, faithful to her religion, and they had promised her all along that she would go to heaven if she followed the rules and worshiped according to her religion’s customs and rules. And that all the others, those others who had followed the rules and customs of other religions, would be turned away. She knew she had worshipped the right way, for they told her that her entire life, so she had it made.

Except…

She was turned away at the gates. She wasn’t alone. Around her stood the dejected members of a bunch of those other religions who had also been told their whole lives that they had the only right way, and all these others were judged wrong too, when they approached the gate.

In utter disbelief, she cried out, “How could I have had the wrong one?” 

All her life, she smugly knew that she had it right. That part had felt real good. And mocking those of other religions felt real good, too. This made her own faith more real, more right, to make the others wrong. All the other rejected people outside the gates had the same confused look on their faces. Why, some of the other rejected people had felt so strongly that their religion was the right one that they had killed those who differed. They were invested in this, so they were even more disappointed.

Must have felt awful, after she had spent her life and then died, to think she had not worshiped the correct truth. So imagine how badly she felt when she saw other people who had followed her religion welcomed through the pearly gates into heaven, along with some who had followed other religions, or none at all. What was that about?

So she checked her hand for the ticket to heaven, and there at the bottom, in the fine print, she found a short statement, a travel restriction she had not noted while alive, that voided her ticket if she chose to criticize those of other faiths, or no faith at all, just so she could feel better about herself at their expense. Too bad it took leaving her life before she actually read that clause. The way the lady comedian told the story, it was pretty funny. Irony, I believe they call this.

Ya see, Marx wasn’t quite right when he claimed religion was no more than opium for the masses. Religion can be good for people, more than simply a cheap thrill, or it can be the evil that history has shown it to be, time and again. Religion is what you make of it, for good or evil. So if we have to invent a heaven to reward doing life properly, should not entrance be based upon doing the right thing rather than doing it wrong? Most every religion teaches of some afterlife, so should not all be welcome? But should not they teach love and acceptance, rather than exclusion and hate, as the key for entrance?

Hardly a day passes in my clinic without a client asking me, “What is the best dog (or cat) food?”

I’ve learned to beg off that question. First, because almost every pet food available now nourishes our pets better than the folks eat in the third world. But the main reason I won’t go there, and why I mostly stay out of certain other debates, is that some folks always show up claiming there is only one true way to eat. You cannot win when the inevitable arguments erupt. For some feel as strongly about the correct diet as they do their religion. And these certain debates always end up rancorous, dividing people who otherwise could be friends. I’ve learned from experience to stay away. 

So you will never see me arguing nutrition, or religion….. or politics.

Right…. And yes, I am an unrepentant liar. 

This is only because some people simply can’t stop themselves. Politics, religion, or nutrition. They have to start these arguments, and often also say some insulting or preposterous thing about the folks with another view, and then somebody who knows differently has to suggest they are sliding out of line. And I keep volunteering to be that somebody.

I know better, but if you gore my ox, and I think you are wrong, how can I resist?

You might wonder when I became the expert on most everything so that I now feel empowered to correct all others. Good question, for that is the key to this essay. This is all about absolute truth, that final answer to the oft asked question, the meaning of life, the holy grail of what if, and why. Important answers to important stuff that people argue about. 

You want to be the guy with the absolute truth when the arguing begins. Thus armed, you get to win when confronted with those silly ideas other folks embrace. You can march through life, tromping over the pathetic losers who chose to follow those silly ideas that run contrary to the absolute truth. Imagine the joy of distancing yourself from those people, of standing alone on the moral high ground.

Lately, I’ve been debating with a young man who sports the resolute confidence that he owns the absolute truths. He has nutrition covered, religion fully comprehended and utterly rejected, and all of politics in his pocket. He has the perfect combination of native intelligence, a thorough exposure to a well- constructed indoctrination that passes for education these days, and a supportive collective of friends who gather to acclaim in unison his unsullied expertise. He not only has all the answers, but he got all them answers right. Just ask him. He is perfectly positioned to proclaim his own invincibility, and to disdain those fools who see the world otherwise.

So most every day he fires up the social media on one of his many devices, and he inserts short missives to support this or condemn that, his inspired take on the world and his virulent attack upon its folly. And the Greek chorus of his friends praises his wisdom and massages his ego, and they collectively mock and rudely insult those who might see the world in any other way. 

And right about now you might be wondering why I should bother to debate with such an opponent, for surely I cannot enjoy these jousts. What drives such folly?

Trust me, I derive no particular pleasure in having my opinions slapped back into my face. I like having my voice valued for its contribution. I know full well that my opinions, when they run contrary to my friend’s, will be divided and conquered, with no quarter given, and no mercy granted. Nothing I have to say has value to my friend, for he sees no need to consider any contrary view. He has the answers. He has the ultimate truths. There are no alternative perspectives. And heaven knows I lack any absolute truths.

But sometimes, when my friend spews his venom and it strikes out at people I cherish and respect, I will claim that he forces me to respond. I simply have no choice.

My friend lashed out at the people who like a song once. He goes to the occasional Red Sox game, and since 911 they’ve taken to playing “God Bless America” during the seventh inning. It pleases many people, this song. But not my friend. 

My friend doesn’t tolerate the mention of God, for he sees no need for this. He is right there with Marx on this one. Only the gullible and the stupid believe in God. So he mocks them. And that whole notion that anyone, especially a God, might actually like the United States, simply drives him to distraction, for as Marx would say, this is a pretty sucky country. So he feels wronged by the notion that every ball fan stands for this song during the seventh inning, and he doesn’t feel like standing. My friend is outraged as he feels forced to stand. So on the social media, he complains. A principled man might shut up and simply sit, but he'd rather be dismissive.

His circle of friends cheer him on. And I look at that Greatest Generation, those folks who weathered the Depression and won the world war, and put the evil of the Nazis and Imperial Japan, and the Soviet Communists on the run, those folks who love “America the Beautiful” and gladly stand when it is played, the few ones left on this earth, and I see my friend dishonor them, and I have to speak. I have to. And thus I get my head handed to me by my young, arrogant friend.

And when my friend, in his youth and inexperience, cheers the traitor who betrayed our country, and he fails to see the folly in this, I let him attack me without conscience or regret because I offer another view. And I continue to offer to him un-requested options to his rants, despite the abuse that flows from him. 

Ya see…I have a plan. Someday, my friend will learn about absolute truth. He will learn that it does not exist, and that despite his passion for his own version of right, he has no moral imperative to abuse those who disagree. Perhaps he will learn only when he reaches the pearly gates, if they exist for him, and he realizes, “We were wrong?” Or perhaps it will come to him sooner, when he still has time to consider that there are more ways to skin that cat. It could happen. It happened to me, after all. So I wait patiently while knocking on that locked door.

I was once the young, arrogant, and well-indoctrinated asshole. And yet eventually, I learned. Smarter people taught me. I’m still an asshole, but I’m a bit less judgmental about it. Cause I figured out, finally, that I’m not always right. Maybe, just maybe, he will someday hear the knock, too.